horses

[SereneReflections]

I managed to snap this during one of the few brief moments of sunshine we had yesterday, and I thought I'd ask for a little feedback.

1) Would you crop it? I like that they have a little space, but cropping might get rid of that pesky telephone pole...

2) Would you take out the fence? (I tried with iphoto, but it doesn't do a great job with that) And what PP program would you recommend?

3) I upgraded from a point and shoot less than three weeks ago, so I am forgiving myself for some shortcomings, in fact, it was something of a success to get a decent exposure on the fly in manual mode. However, if I had a do-over, I think perhaps I would have closed up the aperture a bit and either bumped up the ISO or slowed down the shutter, or perhaps a little of both. Any thoughts, i.e., what would you have done differently?

Thanks

Exposure 1/250, f/5.6, 250mm, 0 EV, ISO 100

[KurtM]

I like it, very nice!

The only thing I could think to suggest is to stick around and take a million shots so you get just the "rightest" possible choice of poses for all the characters in the scene. Nothing wrong with the way it is (I like the goofy bit of grass in the choppers of lead horse), but it would be nice to get all five showing at least a little face (I like the one furthest to the right, with just an eye peeking out).

I really like the DOF. I think a sharper BG would be too "busy", and a blurrier one would remove context. It's a lovely BG, and the slight softness adds charm. I'd call it perfectly done.

Normally, I'd say remove the pole at whatever cost; but this one is pretty unobtrusive. No wires, anyway, and I agree that this picture includes a very nice amount of room around the animals. But then, might try a crop that removes the pole but leaves room on the other side.

The fence doesn't bother me. If it bothers you, stand closer next time and "make it go away".

Them's my two cents, anyway.

[Hill Country Hack]

First off I must say I like the shot. If you want to crop more, I'd only come down from the top just a little.

Your shot is not as sharp as I would have hoped. I appears it was breezy/windy so the misfocus may be a result of camera shake if you were hand holding. You barely met the 1:1 ratio of focal length to shutter speed. You can even have camera shake on a tripod if windy. Personally I would have upped the ISO to obtain a faster shutter speed to negate potential camera shake. I may have also tried stopping down to increase the DOF on the horses so all were in focus and shot some shallower to see if I like that effect.

The DOF is nice and the telephone pole does not bother me. Some may mention the horizon is a bit slanted. I would level the fence line and see if the horses still look good.

[cyber3d]

I like the shot. Not easy to get a grouping like that.

I tried a little editing just to see what it would look like. Here is a link to the image: IMG_0018edited | Flickr - Photo Sharing!

I can post the image here if requested.

I did crop it a bit. eliminated the fence, blurred the background, darkened the background, and changed the curves a bit.

[SereneReflections]

Apologies for the delayed response. My sister having a baby made for a couple of busy days.

Thanks for the compliments. I like the shot too. They had all come running toward me and I hit the shutter just as they stopped all grouped up like that, but unfortunately they didn't stand still for me, so I didn't have a chance to play with the settings. The one whose head you can't see never did lift it up, even after they dispersed.

It was windy, and handheld, with an image stablizer, which helps the sharpness of my shots quite a bit, but they never seem as sharp as I would like. I'm trying to figure that out, but it doesn't really bother me with this one.

I also don't mind the fence that much, but I do like the version without it. However, I think I like the background better in the original.

Oh, and regarding the slanted horizon issue. Around here there is no such thing as a level horizon. If it appears that the camera was tilted that might bother me, but as long there is something to provide context for "level" (in the case the horses) then it's not something I worry about. I will, however, try to avoid having fences run uphill through the frame in the future.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts!